Under the framework of the regional project “Implementing the 2030 Agenda for water efficiency/productivity and water sustainability in NENA countries”, one of the key activities is implementing different Farmer Field Schools (FFS) in the eight studied countries. Palestine one of the countries under the project, suffers from a shortage in available water for irrigation due to the occupation authorities’ control, which is about 85 percent of the groundwater in the West Bank, depriving Palestinians of their historical right to access and use the waters of the Jordan River and restricting the use of floodwater. Therefore, the knowledge obtained from FFS’s is important for farmers as it will support them in more that proper farming methods, but also the right water practices.

In one of the sites in Diarb Balout in Palestine, there are one thousand dunums of snake cucumber and okra crops, where women are the only field workers working there. At first, it was a challenge to get women on board the projects FFS trainings, however, after several trials eighteen of the twenty women in the site accepted support and agreed to create and attend a snake cucumber FFS. Discussions with the women lead us to the base that these women have always used very basic methods of production and harvesting, they had no intention or knowledge to innovate or use any methods to increase crop productivity.  The main challenge was getting one of the women to donate their field to use during the FFS trainings. Basema Fadel, a young Palestinian woman, agreed to donate her field for trials quoting “My field does not give a lot of productivity, so I do not have anything to lose”. Basema and her family, as well as the rest of the participants have been using the traditional method for production and harvesting.